Mosses

Buzzard and starlings, Cadishead Moss

I felt I needed a proper walk on a warm, cloudy day. I decided I'd go and look for dragonflies on the mosses, on the assumption that if I look for them the birds might volunteer to show themselves. The target was to find three species of darter and three of hawker.

I got the 100 from Salford to Cutnook Lane and crossed over the motorway. The turf field on the left was peppered with black-headed gulls and lesser black-backs. Woodpigeons and carrion crows mingled with the horses on Oxcheek Farm but only the one swallow flitted about. It was a quiet walk down the road, a couple of chiffchaffs squeaked, a cormorant flew overhead and a brown hawker patrolled the bracken on the edge of the birch scrub.

Walking up to Croxden's 

A crowd of common darters zipped about at knee height at the intersection with Twelve Yards Road. The walk up to Croxden's was a lot quieter than last time, or would have been if a young buzzard deep in the trees hadn't been begging so loudly. A reed bunting shot across into the rough pasture by the road. Chiffchaffs, wrens and willow warblers tutted me on my way as I passed them. Woodpigeons and swallows passed overhead. A scan through the birch scrub at the pools couldn't even find a mallard.

Marsh thistle
Marsh thistle's a tricky plant to photograph as it's just yards of stem with random flowers at the end so I concentrated on the flowers.

The crows on Croxden's were heard but not seen. Which is more than anything else was.

Common blue damselfly
This has me baffled and I had to ask for help.

I walked back and joined the rough path through the trees. Speckled woods and large whites fluttered about the undergrowth. Black darters and common darters tended to favour the easy pickings over the stands of Himalayan balsam. It was thin pickings for birds, just the squeaks of chiffchaffs and willow warblers in the trees and the challenge of telling one from another. A couple of willow warblers made it easier by breaking into song. Wrens tutted from the depths of nettles and even the magpies were seen but not heard.

Common darter

The path widened and gatekeepers joined the speckled woods in the margins. A mixed tit flock — blue tits, great tits and long-tailed tits broke cover to flit between trees. A couple of emerald damselflies danced over the bracken, there's no other way of describing their flight, it makes a crane fly look purposeful. It took me far too long to be sure that the dragonfly patrolling the fringes of the trees was a common hawker.

There was nothing doing on the pools North of the path though I could hear carrion crows and magpies out in the open country. My stopping to scan a pool through a gap in the birch scrub irritated a pair of sedge warblers which flew up into the trees to scold me on my way. 

Meadow brown showing how the sudden appearance of that eye spot might disconcert a predator

The path broadened still more and the scrubby woodland to the South gave way to barley fields. Meadow browns and a red admiral joined the butterfly mix. Brown hawkers patrolled the bracken and brambles. Linnets and goldfinches flew overhead and into the barley. Woodpigeons clattered about. A yellowhammer surprised me by singing a snatch of song from the depths of the barley. Swallows zipped about and a flock of a dozen swifts hawked and swooped over a field recently vacated by horses.

Chat Moss 

I turned onto the path to Twelve Yards Road, disturbing a couple of buzzards digging for insects in the dung heap on the corner. I'd been little bothered by horseflies so far this time, a few cleggs tried to spoil things and were quickly dispatched. A Southern hawker patrolling the hawthorn hedge came over to check me out before going back to the hunt.

The distressing sound of heavy industrial machinery turned out to be a tiny tractor doing a hay cut on the rough pasture opposite Four Lanes End. I walked down Lavender Lane where the only whitethroats of the day churred my passing. A male kestrel hovered over the field to the North, a female kestrel over the field to the South and a young kestrel sat on the telegraph wires by Four Lanes End. 

Heather

A migrant hawker patrolled the clearing by the entrance to Little Woolden Moss. Robins and willow warblers squeaked in the trees, one of the willow warblers sang. It was dead quiet out in the open moss, a family of carrion crows were the only birds on the dried-up pools. 

Little Woolden Moss 

Woodpigeons passed overhead and small flocks of swallows and swifts drifted by, keeping to treetop height. The wind was blowing cool and all the dragons and damsels had retreated into cover. A gatekeeper fluttering in the heather raised my hopes for my first large heath of the year for a moment.

There was a linnet there a moment ago 

I decided to walk down Moss Road into Irlam. There wasn't a lot of birds in the fields, most of them carrion crows and woodpigeons. A young pied wagtail glowed white against the black of a ploughed field. I stopped and scanned the field and as I got my eye in I found there was a couple of dozen pied wagtails on there. There was more birdlife around the farmsteads with house sparrows, collared doves and blackbirds in the hedgerows, linnets and swarms of swallows about the farm buildings. Just before the motorway a crowd of starlings shared the telegraph lines with a buzzard. Not a chance they'd have stuck around had it been a falcon or sparrowhawk.

Collared doves

I asked myself if I had the legs for a wander round New Moss Wood and the answer was no so I walked down through the allotments for the bus back to the Trafford Centre. I'd found two species of darter and four of hawker. I've still not managed to see any ruddy darters this year.